The Global / Oceanic / Nineteenth Century: An International Symposium and Workshop
Hosted by the Society for Global Nineteenth-Century Studies
November 5-6, 2022
Mount Saint Mary’s University (Doheny campus), Los Angeles, USA
CALL FOR PAPERS
Abstracts due by September 1
To celebrate the inaugural issue of Global Nineteenth-Century Studies (GNCS), a journal published by Liverpool University Press, the Society for Global Nineteenth-Century Studies (SGNCS) will host a two-day symposium on oceanic approaches to nineteenth-century culture, ecology, economics, history, and politics in a range of global contexts. Intentionally broad in scope, the symposium seeks to cross-map nineteenth-century studies with key currents of the blue humanities, the Black and circum-Atlantic, Indian Ocean studies, oceanic ecologies, post- and decolonialism, maritime globalization, and beyond. We welcome participants from any discipline and at any stage of their scholarly career.
The majority of the panels and events will be held in Los Angeles at the Doheny campus of Mount Saint Mary’s University. To facilitate global connections and conversations, the symposium will also feature live panels and audience participants in several sites around the world, including Australia, China, and South Africa.
PANELS AND POSSIBLE TOPICS
The symposium will feature three thematic panels and several open panels. The three thematic panels take inspiration from a trio of articles in the first issue of GNCS.
Panel 1: “Hydrographies: (Re)writing Oceanic Spaces”
Inspired by Charne Lavery’s article, “The Southern Indian Ocean and the Oceanic South”
Possible topics include:
— the blue humanities
— Indian Ocean studies
— the global / oceanic South
— navigation, exploration, and “discovery”
— naval geopolitics and hydrocolonialism
— living “in the wake” of empire
— oceanic ecologies and the nonhuman sea
— oceanic zones; the littoral and the submarine; surface and depth
— shorelines and seascapes
Panel 2: “Maritime Mercantilism: Oceanic Exchanges and Microhistories”
Inspired by Boyd Cothran and Adrian Shubert’s article, “Maritime History, Microhistory, and the Global Nineteenth Century: The Edwin Fox”
Possible topics include:
— globalization and maritime circulations and exchanges
— shipping, infrastructure, and logistics
— maps, charts, and logbooks
— DH approaches to global / oceanic / nineteenth-century history
— maritime materialisms and object histories
— micro / macro scales of oceanic history
— labor and leisure at sea
— maritime economies (including piracy)
Panel 3: “Home and Away: Oceanic Circulations and Travellers”
Inspired by Humberto Garcia’s article, “The Strangers’ Home for Asiatics, Africans and South Sea Islanders: Inaugurating a Hospitable World Order in Mid-Victorian Britain”
Possible topics include:
— maritime mobility and immobility
— lascars on land and at sea
— the Black and circum-Atlantics
— enslavement and diaspora
— immigration and emigration
— Indigenous / subaltern knowledge of the ocean
— dockside geopolitics
— oceanic imperialism, patriotism, and xenophobia
Panels 4 and beyond: “Cross-Currents: The Global / Oceanic / Nineteenth Century”
Inspired by all three articles, but opening space for new topics and debates
Possible topics include (but are not limited to) the listings above, as well as:
— feminist oceanic studies
— women sailors and sailors’ women
— queering maritime history
— philosophy / theology and the sea
— oceanic forms
— shipwreck and salvage
— pollution and waste
— floods and tides
— pedagogy and teaching oceanic texts
Each session will feature 3-4 panelists and 1-2 respondents. (Papers will be sent to the respondents in advance.) Panelists will have 15 minutes to present their work. Afterward, the respondents will reflect upon and synthesize common threads before opening up discussion to a wider audience.
WORKSHOP AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS
As we celebrate the first issue of GNCS, the Society for the Global Nineteenth-Century Studies also looks ahead to future publications. Selected symposium participants will be invited to a collaborative online writing workshop in 2023. Across several structured rounds of peer and self-review, each participant will give and receive feedback, ask questions, and make further connections. Afterward, revised papers may be considered for publication in GNCS or in the Studies in the Global Nineteenth Century book series by Liverpool University Press.
HOW TO APPLY
To apply to the symposium, please submit a 300-word abstract and 1-page CV to globaloceanic19c@gmail.com
